February 21, 2018

Second Corn-Based Ethanol Plant Scheduled for Mato Grosso

Author: Michael Cordonnier/Soybean & Corn Advisor, Inc.

Farmers in Mato Grosso will have another option for selling their corn when a recently announced second corn-based ethanol production facility is built by FS Bioenergia in the city of Sorriso in central Mato Grosso. Mato Grosso is the largest corn producing state in Brazil and the municipality of Sorriso is the largest corn producing municipality in Brazil. Mato Grosso always has a corn surplus, so utilizing more corn to produce ethanol is welcome news for farmers in the state.

FS Bioenergia's first corn-based ethanol production facility was inaugurated last June in the city of Lucas do Rio Verde also in central Mato Grosso. The company already has plans to expand the first facility and when both facilities are at full capacity, they will utilize 3.1 million tons of corn annually. These two facilities along will consume more than 10% of the corn produced in the state.

The new facility in Sorriso, which is currently in the process of obtaining licenses, will utilize 1.8 million tons of corn annually to produce 680 million liters of ethanol, 500,000 tons of DDGs, 20,000 tons of corn oil, in addition to producing excess electricity which will be sold back into the grid.

The new facility is expected to cost R$ 1 billion reals or approximately $310 million dollars. FS Bioenergia is a joint venture between Tapajos Participacoes S/A from Brazil and Summit Agricultural Group from the United States.